My work with dads is rooted in the belief that every fathering role deserves recognition, support, and dignity. One framework that has deeply shaped how I show up in this work is the Diversity-Informed Tenets for Work with Infants, Children, and Families, developed by the Irving Harris Foundation. These Tenets are widely used across the infant and early childhood mental health field, and they offer guidance on how to approach families with reflection, humility, and a commitment to equity.
At the heart of the Tenets is a simple but powerful idea:
we can only support families well when we reflect on our own identities, experiences, and biases.
This means paying attention to how racism, classism, sexism, homophobia, ableism, and other systems of oppression show up in our lives and in the lives of the families we serve. I come back to this often in my work—asking myself what assumptions I may be bringing into a space and how I can create room for all fathers, in all their forms, to feel seen and respected.
The Tenets also emphasize the importance of honoring diverse family structures. Families define themselves. Fathering roles may be held by self-identified dads, non-birth parents, foster or adoptive parents, LGBTQ+ parents, kinship caregivers, or father-figures who play a central role in a child’s life. Recognizing this helps me use language consciously and inclusively. It’s why The DAD Projects includes a Language & Inclusion statement—to make clear that when I say “dad,” I am speaking to a much broader and beautifully varied group of caregivers.
Finally, the Tenets remind us that supporting families is not just about individual relationships—it’s also about acknowledging the systems that shape those relationships. Part of my work is to continue learning, reflecting, and doing what I can to open space for fathers who have been historically overlooked or undervalued in early parenting.
If you would like to read the full Diversity-Informed Tenets, you can find them through the Irving Harris Foundation:
https://www.diversityinformedtenets.org
You can also download a PDF version here:
Diversity-Informed Tenets (PDF)
